


O, Holy Night.

by tnnyoh



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Christmas Fluff, F/M, Falcobblepot, Fluff and Angst, Sofwald
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-22 03:52:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13158696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tnnyoh/pseuds/tnnyoh
Summary: On Christmas Eve, Oswald's thoughts are interrupted by an unexpected visitor.





	O, Holy Night.

It was Christmas Eve in Gotham and snow was falling at an alarming pace from the sky, Oswald Cobblepot watched it from the window and sighed.  He remembered Christmas celebrations with his mother, she would always play music from where she used to live and tell him stories about different holiday traditions.  
  
He hated being alone normally, though he didn't show it.  He felt it made him appear weak, and that was one thing he didn't want people to view him as.   But during the holidays, he was more alone than ever and felt the ache for any kind of human connection more than he did before.    Things had been so hard this past year, nearly a year and a half.  He recalled falling for Edward, believing that the man was his friend and then being stabbed in the back.    
He chuckled bitterly as he took a sip of wine, He had promised himself he wouldn't get attached to anyone that way again, he would never feel those kind of feelings again.  But then Sofia Falcone came to Gotham and tricked and manipulated him to believing she was his friend, that he could trust her.   and it was all for her own selfish obsessive reasons, all to get back at Jim Gordon for murdering her brother. All because she felt unloved by her father.   Oswald swirled the wine in his glass and thought about Carmine.  
  
The man was a mentor to him, he had been for years, Oswald learned so much from him when he was under his wing, he learned so much when he was playing Fish, Maroni, and Carmine.  In the world of the Mafia, he was forgiven for stealing Carmine's empire and all the dirty tricks he played.  Those things are all part of the game, and in Gotham, you have to play the game.  
Jim Gordon learned that lesson the hard way, he refused to play the game when he came to Gotham.  He came to gangsters and mobsters for help with problems he was too "clean" to solve.   If he had dealt with Oswald the goodie GCPD way, Sofia never would have taken control of the city.

  
He wondered about Sofia, how can a man that had taught him so much about Gotham have been an uncaring father?  Was there something wrong with Sofia? He had spent a long while thinking up revenge schemes for what Sofia had done to him.  
But then he remembered.... After he woke up from nearly dying when Ed shot him into the Gotham river, When he had met Fish again she had told him there were more important things than revenge, she taught him there was more to life than hatred and revenge.    
Should he extend that forgiveness to someone who dethroned him?  He mused about how often he seemed to find himself in this position.  Down and out, everything was taken from him.  
He had heard about Zsasz leaving town, sometime after he betrayed Oswald to work with Sofia, he turned on her when he found out she had set up the hit on her own father. Nobody had seen him since.  Oswald still felt angry that Zsasz had turned against him so easily, so quickly.  
But then he reminded himself that the only reason he worked with him in the first place was that Carmine Falcone demanded it.  
He was loyal to the last, but only to the right man.  What was Oswald but a usurper?

  
There it was again, he felt out of place and never belonging, He always felt that way in school when he was young and among the citizens of the city, it felt like Gotham was always reminding him that he wasn't supposed to be here, he had no place here, he didn't fit.  
His thoughts were interrupted by a crash, a vase had been knocked over in the hallway.  He set the wine glass down and pushed himself out of the chair, grabbing for his cane to steady him.  He grabbed his pistol from the table and headed to the hallway.  
He saw a shadow darting from behind the wall and knocking over something else, He cocked the pistol and pointed it outwards "Obviously I'm going to shoot you, you might as well come out"  
"Please" a voice he recognized well. It was the voice of the woman who destroyed his life and put him in a cell at Arkham.  She came out from behind the corner, Sofia Falcone.  She was wearing a long black coat covered in snow.  Oswald couldn't help but notice the snowflakes caught in her hair and the look in her eyes.  
It was the look he recognized in himself all too often, loneliness.  
His grip on the gun wavered "Give me one reason I shouldn't shoot you right now" His voice was shaking almost as much as his hands, she walked closer to him, tracking snow all over the floor  
"I don't have one, you have every right to kill me.  At this point I deserve it, I welcome it.  But I came here because I have nowhere else to go... So, if you're going to shoot me, please just make it quick"  
He lowered the gun  
"What.... happened?" He asked in spite of himself  
He hesitated before adding "Not that I care"  
She shrugged "I've lost." She said, tears forming in her eyes "Gotham is Gordon's now." She shook her head as Oswald approached her  
"You must be loving this," She said "Everything I did, karma is finally giving it back to me tenfold"  
Oswald knew that he should be thrilled she had lost it all, he should have been joyous. But he felt sick when he looked at her.  
He ignored her comment "Why don't you come in, You look cold"  
"Oh Oswald," She said, breaking into tears and throwing herself at him "I can never take back what I have done, and I have nothing, and nobody left. "  
He stood there, he wasn't sure what to do.  He wanted to hug her back, he wanted to kiss her forehead, and brush her hair away from her eyes.  He wanted to promise she'd be safe, but instead, he pushed her away.  Her hurt was discernible in her eyes.  Rejection.  
He did not want her to feel that.  He knew first hand how painful rejection was.  No matter where it was coming from.  
He motioned for her to follow him into the main room, a fire was crackling in the fireplace and casting a warm glow over the furniture.  Sofia sat down on the couch  
"I know that this is so much to ask, but I don't have anywhere else to go. I'm homeless.  Can I please stay here tonight?"  
He sat at the far end of the couch "That is..."

  
"Hard to believe?" Sofia asked  
"What happened?"  Oswald asked in spite of himself, He couldn't help it.  Even after everything that had happened he still had a soft spot for this girl.  
"Jim found a way to prove what I had done, all of Gotham knows that I ordered the hit on my father.  They will never trust me again"  
"They are well within their right not to Sofia, you manipulated this city into your own.  You 'won' Gotham but you won her the wrong way, and you..."  
"I know!" She said, shivering from the cold "I deserve this, I deserve to lose it all while you laugh in my face.  Jim Gordon was just as smug as you're being right now"  
"Jim?"  
"I saw him"  
Oswald felt a sting in his stomach, he wondered if a bowling ball to the head would hurt less than hearing that Sofia was still seeing Jim.  
"I know what you're thinking," She said, "Jim and I... we aren't... we never were"  
"You and Jim shared many quiet moments together, plotting my destruction, plotting your little theft of my city, my throne."  
"This isn't a royal court Oswald. Jim came to me for 'help' getting rid of you, and I merely used it as an excuse, it was the only way I could get back at the man who murdered my brother, the easiest way.  I had nothing against you! Not even for taking the city from my father all those years ago! You were just in the way"  
"You kissed Jim! How the hell does kissing Jim have anything to do with revenge!? How could you be that close to the man who killed your brother?"  
"I... I was using him" She sniffled, Oswald had no way of knowing if she was faking crying or not.  "I don't..."  
"I want you to honestly tell me you feel nothing for James Gordon"  
"I don't... I don't, nothing but contempt and hatred.  I used him because I knew he just wanted a toy to play around with and he thought that I was that toy"  
"How am I supposed to believe anything you say?"

  
She turned to him, she looked oddly vulnerable in the light of the fireplace.  He never saw her this way before, it seemed like her various masks just melted away like the snow outside "You're not" She said sadly, a tear rolling down her cheek and catching the orange glow of the fire "You were the one person in Gotham who was nice to me and I used you... You were perfectly content to be my friend, to help me with things for the orphanage... to befriend Martin."  
"Only to find out it was all lies" Oswald responded.  His hands were shaking worse than when he was holding the gun, he was feeling anger at the memories of what she did, but even more so at himself for wanting to forgive her.

  
"It wasn't all lies, Oswald" She looked down, as she did this he moved closer to her and placed a hand on her shoulder, she glanced at this gesture and moved to look him in the eyes but he caught her by surprise, pulling her gently into a kiss.  He felt electricity shooting through his body and his hands weren't trembling anymore.  He pulled away from the kiss and looked at the fireplace shyly.

  
"Well" Sofia began,  her voice shaking "That was certainly something I didn't expect"  
Oswald turned back to her "Don't think this means you are off the hook for what you've done" He said, awkwardly running his fingers through his hair.  Messing up the style.  
She nodded, though she was barely concealing a smile.

  
"Oh no of course not, This is Gotham, I've learned to expect the unexpected. I've learned that your friends are your enemies and your enemies are your friends and I've-"  
Oswald rolled his eyes "Oh shut up" He said, pulling her into his arms and into a deeper kiss.  
The fire raged on, and the snow fell heavy on the streets of Gotham as two lost souls found themselves in each other's arms.  The blankets of snow covering all former sins of the citizens of the city.  This was a time to be born anew, to be found once again.  Gotham was the home of Sofia Falcone, and Oswald Cobblepot and they intended to share it together.  



End file.
